(http://i1185.photobucket.com/albums/z342/Jon_Weingarden/20130205_193833_zpse263ae8c.jpg)
Blurry amps!
Nice man! I may have to go check one out, how much does it weigh?
About 40lbs - not bad compared to my Mark III!
Dude i'm jealous! Super cool!
That MKIII is made out of anti-matter. Thing is heavier than a black hole.
Now all you need is an ABC box ;D ;D ;D
Those 5:25's are really nice amps! We have a 5:50+ at work w/ a salt and pepper grille, sounds and looks pretty killer.
Yea, the 5:50+ isn't much lighter than the MKIII so that was really out of question.
I've had local radio playing through the speaker (although somewhat quietly) for the past two days, plus a handful of hours of playing. Hopefully the speaker will be broken in soon.
A 3-way splitter would be cool with the three amps, but the SFDR is sold ($1300) and boxed to ship tomorrow.
That Fender didn't last long!
The SFDR was absolutely incredible - best Fender I have played I think!
It had ridiculous headroom as well, but at the sweet spot, I would notice it just barely breaking up on my leads and I hate any type of distortion after delay. I definitely did not want to add an effect loop to it, so I figured I would pass it on to a good home (or a good paying home).
Go heady Go!
Welcome to the club. I have the 5:25 and love it immensely. "Better Cleans" GEQ, I lust for one of these as well.
Yea, I saw the 5:25 before the + came out and was thinking it would be perfect if they added the GEQ.
I tried an experiment today:
5w setting - MV 8 or 9 o'clock
SM57 on the grill to Mixer
El Capistan in mixer's FX Loop (in stereo)
Mixer to Studio Monitor Headphones
My friends were playing videogames in the next room and didn't realize I was jamming out. Got it to sound pretty decent for such a low volume - definitely nice to know I can play at nearly any hours without pissing someone off!
The El Cap rocks in stereo going through my cans! Can't wait to add the Microverb to the mix - any day!
Word of warning...
the EL84s seem.... well .... prone to shorts. My first set (stock) of EL84s were replaced under warrentee, Mesa was more helpful then the local authorized dealer. I just had to return the latest set for the same reason.
Failure mode - >Loss of power ... weak distorted fizzle
- First time it happened , I switched from 5 to 25/30 mode (in standby) and it happened withing a few min. It only happened in 25w mode. In 25 W one is running way hotter than the other.
The last set I replaced , both tubes shorted in both positions/settings.
Current set .. Solid (White) no shorts in any modes.
I take care to switch modes in standby. Perhaps doing it with the power off may be better.
They may have tweaked something to fix it in the plus.
If they didn't, No worries. It's the tubes. I'm running 50/50 but never got stuck with a bad set.
I love mine and I REALLY want a plus.
And yes the 5 watt mode is wonderful all the I really have all the headroom or gain I want at "bedroom" levels.
Have you tried low gain blues for your clean sound and high gain crunch for your lead tone yet?
There is great tone all over this amp. Match it with a KOT (due today) or TS9s. Add an external cabinet and you have a monster do anything amp.
Hmm, never heard that about the EL84's... hope that issue is fixed - thats a huge drain on money.
I hadn't tried the Blues for clean and Crunch for lead. I had tried the Blues for lead and liked it, but that 2nd channel has a lot more treble which I am not sure I like - maybe I'll like it more as the driver mellows, so far I am preferring just the GEQ for leads.
No drain on money. In all cases it was within the 6 months for the tubes. Mesa and dealers have all come through at no additional cost to me.
Yea... so just frustrating I guess.
Mesa tubes are awesome though! I run green 6L6's in my Soul-O 45 and they seem great so far. I want to emulate the wattage selector w/ my Soul-O. With the parallel loop and master is this possible?
Yea, I don't have beef with Mesa tubes - the SFDR I had came with them in it and it sounded incredible. They are rebranded from only decent sources, but hand-picked for superior quality (which is fairly common, such as Ruby tubes).
You can't emulate the wattage selector the way you are describing. The wattage selector decreases the efficiency of the power/output section of the amp by actually changing the circuitry, while what your describing is just choking off more preamp amplitude before reaching the power section. In other words, dropping the wattage lets you keep driving the power tubes, while choking the volume down keeps the power tubes from working hard and keeps them clean. The only caveat is choking the volume down after the PI - its possible your MV or fx loop are after the PI, but I don't know. In this case, you would be pushing the PI (which is considered part of the power amp), but not the power tubes - the PI is the first part of the power section to overdrive and contributes a lot of the 'overdriven power amp' tone. Also, I assume your talking about putting a volume pedal in your parallel loop? A parellel loop, rather than the more common series loop, may not be ideal for this - its still passing signal around the loop, in parallel to the loop, then probably has a recovery tube and resistor to recombine the signal (like a mixer), thus you would only be choking/attenuating part of the signal and would less impart on the ultimate volume. Not to mention, when using a parallel loop, you would usually want to use 100% / effect only / killdry effects in the loop, otherwise your effects could be more subtle and your dry signal could end up out of phase.
You are starting to sound like you know what your talking about. You have great insight Heady.
Lol, thanks Happy - glad I'm convincing whether or not I'm spot on accurate ;)